"We'll try to give our fans some information and give them some substance, something new," Dale Earnhardt Jr. said of his new online podcast. / Sam Sharpe, USA TODAY Sports

by Jeff Gluck, USA TODAY Sports

by Jeff Gluck, USA TODAY Sports

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. - Dale Earnhardt Jr. and friends are coming to a podcast near you.

Earnhardt and his JR Motorsports team are launching a radio-style podcast called The Dale Jr. Download, which will serve as the first program on a new online network as Dirty Mo Radio.

The weekly podcasts will be based at Earnhardt's personal website, DaleJr.com, but will also be available on iTunes. All podcasts will be free of charge.

Dirty Mo Radio - the "Mo" being a reference to Earnhardt's hometown of Mooresville, N.C. - is the brainchild of JR Motorsports communications director Mike Davis, who hosted a popular weekly video on the Nationwide Series team's website called JRM 360.

The success of the fun-loving JRM 360, Earnhardt said during Thursday's NASCAR Media Day, was not only a hit with fans but "brought a lot of traffic to our Nationwide site to help bring recognition to our partners there."

Building an online podcast network - which later could feature programming based around topics such as music, fantasy football or NASCAR history - will build on what JRM 360 started.

Earnhardt said he'll be "physically in and out" of the broadcasts - which will be hosted by Davis and Charlotte-area radio personality Taylor Zarzour - but will have a major interest in the programming.

"There's some potential there to do some fun stuff," he said. "We'll try to give our fans some information and give them some substance, something new. ... This will give them an opportunity to give them that feedback and tell them what's going on around the company and exactly what we're working on and what we're dealing with."

The Dale Jr. Download - which will air Mondays beginning Feb. 18 - will focus on recapping the previous weekend's race but also give fans insight on Earnhardt's life.

In addition to the races, Earnhardt said the podcasts will "talk about what we're doing out on the property, anything fun that might be popping up that we want to share with our fans, anything we might be doing downtown at (his nightclub) Whisky River."

"It's similar with what we did with our old XM radio show (Dale Jr. Unrestricted), but a little bit more professional than that," he said. "We were pretty ragtag back then, really didn't know what the hell we were doing. I mean, it was fun, but we didn't work hard enough to try to be relevant and stick around.

"This is a great place for us to provide content for our fans, but also give our partners more bang for their buck."